What Does Bayonetta 2’s NPD Absence Mean?

NPD released their report from October detailing the top selling games of the month a couple days ago. Bayonetta 2, however, was nowhere to be seen. Nintendo followed up with a statement a few hours later, but once again, Bayonetta was not mentioned. Though they discussed the success of Super Smash Bros. 3DS and their big 3DS sellers over the years, there was nothing of everybody’s favorite Umbra Witch. So what does this mean? Did Operation Platinum fail? Did Bayonetta 2 sell horribly? What does it mean?

Bayonetta 2, DriveClub and Sunset Overdrive weren't mentioned because they all sold like crap.

It sucks for Platinum Games since they do make great titles, but Viewtiful 101 flopped hard and I'm not surprised that Bayonetta 2 didn't perform very well either. There's a reason third parties have a reputation of selling abysmally on Nintendo consoles.

P* games have a history of selling poorly EVERYWHERE. Bayo 1 performed poorly on its release, on consoles with far larger install base, Vanquish, Okami (might as well be P*), infinite space, etc. Metal Gear Rising is the only game I can think of that was a sales success, and that's in part because of the Metal Gear name.

If Bayonetta sold so well on 360 and PS3 the sequel would have come to the systems Platinum intended it to be on.

A lot of people focus specifically on sales figures of games when defending third parties but don't take into account that sales aren't cutting it anymore.

If sales are all that matter then explain why Tomb Raider, Bayonetta, Dead Space 3, Sleeping Dogs and Hitman are all stated by their publishers to be commercial failures.

Dev costs seem to be doing these games in anyway regardless of Nintendo. Bayonetta lifetime sales are over 2 million and it flopped? How does that happen? It was on the consoles which third parties praise so high so they can't blame Nintendo for that.

At last count, it was a little over 300K and rising, and it's not even to its first Christmas yet.

The first game needed 6 months to get anywhere near the final numbers it did, and Bay 2 is guaranteed to sell longer and better than the series did the first time round after all the attention it's gotten and all the recommendations it will continue to get as one of the best core titles of 2014.

Its lack of presence on the charts is a little worrying, but even if it only managed to sell 50K during that time, all it'd have to do is maintain that sales pace for the next few months and it'll easily reach the 500K mark, which'll be great for such a small install base compared to what the first game had to sell to.

sunset overdrive had like 4 days in the months report, that's it. how many did driveclub have? they also dont count digital sales and bundles. which likely impacts driveclub and sunset more so than bayonetta.

If it didn't sell well now, it surely won't do any better once Smash Bros gets released. As for operation platinum or whatever that same dedication should be applied to every Wii U 3rd party game exclusive or not. ;)

We are along way off from either the xbox or Playstaion. Bayo 1 sales numbers so far - if the holiday sales don t lift it enough to come close to a 1 million (I don t think it will) then the Wii u exclusive may never catch up to those sales- another thing to remember is both I and II are included in the Wii inversion

I hate it for Platinum - they make some of the best games out there but so far the sales just are. Not there

We all know Bayo 2 did not sell that much, fans were making it seem as if it was the envy of all Sony and Microsft fans but the honest truth Bayo 1 sold barely more than a million on both consoles with an install base of 75 million each. It is the reason that Bayo 2 didnt come to Sony or XBOX, based on sales they didnt want to fund a game that wasnt going to turn a profit.

Yeah right Bayo was expected to be a money maker lol smh I never said it wasnt a good game just nothing ppl wanted to run out and buy.

It's out-sold the first weeks' sales of the original, which took 6 months to do anything decent. If it sells 50K a month[which it definitely will manage, and probably beat] from now till March or April, it'll hit 500K and will be on its way to 1M easy.

And that's before counting in digital sales, Black Friday, and Christmas.

You just sound bitter that you never got the chance to own it on the system your lips are glued to.

Wii U is failing, simple as that, we knoew the sales are down, Nintendo are crying for games thats why they've got this and the YET AGAIN delayed Devils Third, there won't be a third game due to the sales of it.

Third party Developers.....please stop wasting your time/money making games for the Wii u. If its not Mario...Zelda...pikman it will sell the sh%t...thats a FACT...disagree all u want.....ps Driveclub has sold over 1mil. copies

maybe all developer who dont sell over 1 million copies of anything should cease to even exist?

Drive club had the luxury of being a launch title and then delayed outside the launch window. During that time it was pushed at every single sony event.. So its sales had more to do with it being pushed ontop of the genre it supported.

".ps Driveclub has sold over 1mil. copies" Doesn't mean it has 1 million players though. Isn't it STILL broken? Mario Kart Wii sold over 35 Million. That's double the entirety of the 'Uncharted' franchise. Soooo....Whats your point?

Speaking of a point though, what does it tell you the majority of third party games when thy have to compete with Nintendo's own IP's? Ubisoft may have only just started to annoy the gaming "community" but they've been dicking around with the WiiU for about a year now. The only game (not including Just Dance) they've released for the WiiU and it has worked exactly how you'd expect was Rayman Legends. Everything else had bugs, glitches, frame rate issues, missing content and general problems all over. Parity, my arse. Doesn't stop some of the games from being fun thou; ZombiU and Splinter Cell for example but there comes a point hwere its just not worth it. They just don't match up to the quality a Nintendo player is use to. Ubisoft aren't the only ones either. There have been many half arsed ports and backward thinking ideas from several developers and publishers. I could really get into it but in my opinion, with way developing games has become when it comes to multiplats from third party developers, they either A. cant afford to make them right B. don't know how to make them right C. just don't want to D. just don't care or E. Make sure its filled with micro transactions and DLC. Its get as much money as possible with as little effort as possible.

So you are saying ps4 has more suckered gamers right? For some reason I hear no one complaining about bayo2. Seriously it doesn't matter what system the game comes out on, only a child runs from a game console that has cute games on it and misses out on good games.

Platinum Games aren't Third Party Developer they are Independent Developer who seeks funding. They have no control over platform they develop on. It the Publisher that decide. Platinum Games don't have money. They are mercenaries.

Pretty certain that mature buyers'/gamers' who own a WiiU would "only" maybe occupy about 15 to 25 percent max maybe even less if you add-in the global WiiU mature owners of the console.

So I'm not surprised the game would not generate a lot of sales.

Noticed also on most retail shops that they place the Bayonetta 2 game out of sight with the other WiiU games. Fact is they ( retail shops ) don't want the parents to see this next to a Super Mario game.

Three points to be noted. This is only the top ten. The game was released with one week to go in October. All these games with the exception of Super Smash Bros. for the 3DS are multiplatform with up to 5 versions.

Facts are Facts. Third party games don't sell well on the Wii u. Developers are wasting time/money. Nintendo needs to shed that Walt Disney image. Bayonetta 2 looks awesome......but it seems out of place on the wii u. just my opinion.

It means that while Nintendo superfans like monkeyman above rant and rave about the game, the majority of Wii U owners were not and are not going to be interested in the game.

This doesn't at all reflect on the quality of the game, though. Like the original, I'm certain it's a great game; however, the game is part of a niche whose audience doesn't particularly buy Nintendo home consoles. That, however, is something most of us knew beforehand.

This is a weird thing indeed. Not sure where VGChartz got there numbers from but at according to them. Its at 300k global. Interesting, and yes this is VGchartz after all but I'm sure this game sold pretty damn well. So if these numbers are just an estimate. Bayonetta 2 is off to a great start.